The Legend

Wednesday, January 31, 2018

A couple weeks back AJ sent me a large envelope with this bad boy inside. What a cool surprise!

Before I started blogging I was active collecting just about every piece of Pirates memorabilia under the sun. Getting married and then starting family put a stop to these type of purchases as most of the disposable collecting income goes towards cards now. So I'm extra thankful that AJ thought of me when he dug this out. I love these type of pieces.

The envelope also included some cardboard.

Success begins in the classroom. It will make you have a rocket arm and earn millions of dollars.

You too can graduate and become a world class athlete .

One of my favorite Pirate cards of the year. Each made history as the first MLB player from their respective homelands.

Chrome version!

Osuna got a long look last year with Marte's suspension. Not really seeing how he makes the team next year. It looks like his bat would play, but Josh Bell is the first baseman. His outfield defense left something to be desired.

Former WV Black Bear Kevin Newman. If all goes well, he may be the starting shortstop this summer.

Unique shot of the camo jersey. Going to be weird not seeing Cole and Cutch at Spring Training.

Thanks for the cards and year book AJ. Such a nice surprise. Maybe I should start digging around for hidden treasures. I think I have a lamp in my attic, you want it? Doesn't look like I have any Yankees treasures.

Tuesday, January 30, 2018

So I went to the Creed Bratton concert on Friday with my wife. It was a good time. Most of the music he played was original spanning from his time in the band The Grass Roots and various solo albums he came out with over the last 10 to 15 years.

The flow of the show was to play a song and then take a few minutes break to tell some jokes and stories about his time on The Office.

We were off to the side (close proximity to bar!) so the sound might not be perfect. I've never uploaded a video that wasn't YouTube to blogger so this might not even work.

Here are some pics.

His show ran an hour and fifteen minutes or so. The tickets were cheap so that seemed about the perfect amount of time.

How about some awesome beer I've tried recently.

Modern Times is a brewery out of San Diego. I went there a couple years back and loved it. They have really blown up since then and have added some eastern distribution in the DC and Pennsylvania area. Good news for me.

Brew Gentleman is based in Braddock Pennsylvania and would get my vote as the best brewery in the area. They have been winning awards for their IPA's, but they experiment a lot with different styles. Such was the case with this oak aged ale infused with nectarines. Kind of gives it a champagne like taste.

Shared this with my brother. Fifty/Fifty is a California brewery that specializes in stouts aged in high end barrels. It was good, but these beers carry a hefty price tag. Glad he bit the bullet and not me.

Victory at Sea is a well known beer if you are familiar with Ballast Point. This released used that base beer and aged it in High West barrels. It was awesome and I just picked up some more!

Most people know Oskar Blues beers as they've been around for a long time. Ten Fidy is their base imperial stout, but once a year they break out the barrel aged version. It is soooo good.

You are probably sensing a theme of the type of beers I've been drinking. I do love barrel aged beers...

Another barrel aged beer from a well know craft brewery. Bell's is another member of the old guard and is probably one of the bigger craft brewers out there.

Not for some mail. I have plenty to catch up on this coming week. I know I received mail from The Lost Collector, Sportscards from the Dollar Store and Angels in Order. I'll be posting soon.

Want to see some advanced level trolling....

That is 17 PWE's from a certain Josh Willingham fan in Alabama. I'll be breaking those open soon as well. Kids these days.

In case you missed it I'm having a little contest for my 4th birthday. Join in here. I'll be closing it down in the next day or two.

Sunday, January 28, 2018

Another year is in the books! The funny thing is I don't feel like the blog has changed a whole lot since I first started. Not quite sure if that is a good or bad thing, but either way I've had a lot of fun. I have no plans of slowing down so hopefully many more anniversaries to come. Guess I just have too much fun interacting with all you maniacs.

If you are newer to my blog, the origin story is here. It is little long winded, but it details what gave me so much time to get things up and running. In case you are wondering my daughter is doing just fine now. She is in preschool and has a motor that doesn't quit. I'm also thankful she has her mothers looks.

Finally, big thanks to all of those who send me cards and comment on the blog. I really do appreciate it. We all blog for ourselves, but the interaction is nice motivation to keep going. Big virtual high five to everyone.

As a thank you leave a comment below to be entered into a contest. Since it is my 4th birthday I'll pick the top 4 entries the randomizer spits out. I'll close the contest as soon as the comments dry up.

Saturday, January 27, 2018

When the Pirates moved their short season NYPL affiliate to Morgantown I decided that I would collect all cards that showcase a player in the Black Bears uniform. This has been a fun process as only three players have received cards in the teams two year existence (Kevin Newman, Kevin Kramer and Will Craig). All the cards are from Topps Pro Debut. I've been hoping that Heritage Minors would make a Black Bears card, but nothing yet.

Since only a few players have been represented and Pro Debut is a relatively inexpensive set, I've been able to focus on finding parallels. Here is a link to a page I started that shows my progress. My most recent purchases are probably the most unique.

I found most of the Will Craig parallels quickly. Besides the 1/1's I had assumed I was done. Most of my focus had been trying to find the guys that were in the 2016 Pro Debut set. Then I discovered these.

2017 Topps Pro Debut Jumbo Gold Parallel Will Craig /10

2017 Topps Pro Debut Jumbo Will Craig /49

Iknew about the jumbo 5x7 cards, but hadn't realized that Craig got the big card treatment by Topps. Both of these popped up within a few weeks of each other and each time I paid more in shipping than the actual card. Craig's prospect status really took a hit after a bad year last year so his cards have been bottoming out. Obviously I want him to do well, but the savings has been nice for my Black Bears project.

Do I like the jumbo cards....not really. They look fine and dandy, but they are not the easiest to protect and store. Fortunately each seller provided nice top loaders to protect the card. I'll probably slide them in a big binder page with the rest of my Black Bears collection.

I'm sure cards like these drive player collectors nuts.

I'm heading to the WVU/Kentucky basketball game tonight. Should be a fun atmosphere. College Gameday was here this morning and we have the national broadcast tonight.

Wednesday, January 24, 2018

I'm caught up on trade posts (minus a recent lost collector package). Going to be putting some effort into getting return packages out over the next couple of weeks. I'm sitting on some nice cards for many of you, but everything got put on hiatus while my main office computer was out of order. Now that I'm back in business it is time to get to work. I have Sunday earmarked as trade day. I've been active in clearing clutter around my workspace so I'm feeling motivated!

New card time!

While new purchases are always a little slower coming in this time a year I did manage to pick up a few nice cards over the last month.

2017 Signature Archives Postseason Tony Pena 1/1

This set wasn't well received from what I've read online. I guess if you are looking for Derek Jeter and get Tony Womack it can leave you a little salty. Personally if you are opening something that has only one card, you're kind of playing cardboard roulette. Has a one card box ever been well received?

For me this set had the best Pirate auto list I've seen in quite some time. The big one is that Manny Sanguillen signed his first certified autos. I've yet to secure one of those as I think other Pirate collectors are sharing my excitement. They are selling well on the secondary market.

The big get for me was this Tony Pena 1/1. He has had a few Pirate autos in the past, but Archives had the players sign some great cards. Hope to get a few variations of the former Pirate backstop.

2017 Signature Archives Postseason Tony Womack /54

For those who did get Tony Womack and spitefully put them online, I was more than happy to pounce. These are selling for under $5 shipped on most auctions.

Tim Wakefield also has his first Pirate certified auto in the set. While I knew autos featuring him in the Red Sox uniform would sell well, I was caught off guard how high Pirate versions were selling. I've yet to find one at a price I feel comfortable with, but continue to put a considerable amount of effort in finding one at a reasonable price. Hopefully at some point down the road I'll be able to share a Sanguillen and Wakefield!

Thanks for reading. Remember...Friends don't let friends open one card boxes. That is unless they get Pirate cards they want to sell me super cheap on eBay!

Tuesday, January 23, 2018

With every box break comes an awesome trade. I can always count on Kevin to find some great cards for my collection. He always goes above and beyond which is unnecessary, but greatly appreciated.

Weird to say former Pirate Gerrit Cole... As a whole Pirate fans are in a really bad spot right now. Losing the face of the franchise and your best pitcher within a few days of each other doesn't endear yourself with the fanbase.

I would never say this on Twitter because I don't want angry Pirate fans calling me a front office apologist, but I totally get the Cole deal. The perception of Cole is that he is an ace pitcher, but the results tell a different story. The last two years he has been plagued by injury and homers. While he has a ton of value, expecting teams top prospects wasn't fair. Rumors were the Yankees offered Clint Frazier and Chance Adams, but not together. The Astros never offered one of their top prospects. Do you gamble on one big prospect, or get a collection of flawed players in the hope that they develop.

By all accounts Cole had no desire to take any type of deal that would have bought out his arbitration and early free agent years. He had two years of control left. It was time to deal.

This is by no means a knock on Cole. He was healthy last year so that is a great sign. By losing him the Pirates definitely got worse in the short term. If he can suppress the homers, he could slot right back as a top flight starter. You just can't land a teams top prospects with someone putting up numbers like Cole has in the past two years.

/end rant

Triple Threads relics are awesome!

Nice pic of Marte sporting the shades!

I feel like Kevin opened a box of SP. Maybe I'm wrong....Either way that set was awesome.

Superstar Clemente and cardboard legend/blog favorite Wally Moon!!!!!

I always end up talking about Burgess quite a bit because he was part of a pretty famous trade that also brought in Don Hoak and Harvey Haddix.

Biebs!

Thanks for the trade Kevin. What a mix of old and new. The winner was the Clemente/Wally Moon card in my book. What a great card.

Monday, January 22, 2018

Time for a box break. This time around international playboy and Upper Deck enthusiast Kevin of Card Papoy fame chose 2002 Leaf.

Our box breaks have been a little more sparse here lately. Big rookie years from Judge and Bellinger have made shopping for boxes a tad difficult. Normally I would default to standbys like Diamond Kings but even that is about $10-15 more expensive than normal. Anyone seen any good deals lately? I'm up to bat for a box, but have not been swayed by daily deals on the well known sites.

Let's get to the cards.

From what Kevin told Brian and I the box didn't yield much in the way of high end, but still offered a nice glimpse of the period (freaking 16 years ago...yikes).

While this was the time period companies started to shift focus towards autos/relics , you could still find a decent insert here and there. I like the Heading For the Hall inserts. Overall a nice looking card of the Wizard.

Some variation of "Gold Leaf" has been around a long time.

This was my only Pirate card from the break which pretty much sums up what it was like to collect the Pirates in the late 90's/early 2000's. It was pretty much Kendall and Giles with a sprinkling of Aramis Ramirez.

Crime Dog!

I could imagine Gary Sheffield the agent would be kind of intimidating just like Gary Sheffield the player.

Some big names here. Often the complaint with Leaf was poor photos. They all seem too bright and kind of blurry. The inserts have a much better look. Just compare the Lineage cards to the base.

Some blog favorite players.

Overall the box was sort of a bust in terms of cards that can stay in my collection, but it was fun to see a set that I haven't paid attention to in years. Thanks for the break Kevin! I'll show off the trade portion tomorrow.

Sunday, January 21, 2018

This is my first post on my brand new computer! In hindsight I wish I wouldn't have spent as much time trying to fix my old one. It was one of those bare bones Dell computers. While I don't need top of the line, I was probably doing more on the computer than it was built to deal with. Also, I don't think it handled the switch to Windows 10 very well. I read about all kinds of issues concerning glitches when people tried to update. Ultimately that may have been the deathblow.

After finding out that I was in the market for a new computer my pal Dennis (Too Many Verlanders) gave me some great pointers on what I should be looking for with the new computer purchase. Ultimately my new machine is much more equipped to handle the rigors of 8 million Bob Walk scans.

To break in the new machine I thought it be appropriate to showcase cards from Dennis. These were part of a package sent before Christmas. I made note of the main event card already, but this package was full of fantastic cards.

This is probably the coolest bat relic card you will ever find. You could easily make a case for this card being the main event, but I gave the edge to the West auto since he was featured in the WVU uniform. Since Dennis is a big Michigan collector I figured he would understand.

Over the years I feel like Dennis has sent me about 9000 printing plates. While they never scan well, I do like that many of the Panini plates have nicer backs to them.

I'm really not sure what is going to happen to Tavon Austin. The Rams offense really took back off this year, but Tavon's role was non existent. Obviously a trade would be best, but the contract probably makes it hard to get rid of him. My dream is that he will one day become a Patriot as they have such a great track record of utilizing small wideouts.

Probably should just get in the habit of taking cell phone scans of Topps plates. Seems to work best with those and chrome cards.

Plates from Immaculate are crazy thick, but you can get better scans. I think this gets my vote as my favorite plate of the bunch. A couple years back Panini went wild in producing cards of the Waner brothers. It was nice to see more of Lloyd (Little Poison) Waner as his brother Paul seemed to get the most love.

It wouldn't be a trade with Dennis without a ton of WVU cards.

A great assortment of Bulger cards. It was cool to see Marc carve out a nice NFL career after a great college career.

Licensed Press Pass cards are among my favorite of all time. Some of those early sets had the nicest base cards and autos you will find featuring the college uniforms.

Jerry Porter is kind of tough guy to collect. Many of his early autos and relics were right at the beginning of the "hit" boom. Some of those sets now are among the most sought after thus causing low end players like Porter to be more expensive than you would normally think.

I'm still hoping WVU retires Pat White's number at some point. He played in 4 bowl games and won them all. Two of those were BCS games against George and Oklahoma.

So many great WVU cards. You really found quite the assortment Dennis.

Baseball time

GOTG is just such a top notch set. The 2001 version is my favorite!

So many Clemente's! I love the three that feature Roberto and Vlad Guerrero.

DK cards that feature the pre war players look great.

Some Fleer minis.

Love the Reggie Sanders Pirate cards. He only has a few out there and they are not the easiest to find. Some of the low numbered parallels go for big bucks.

Thanks for all the great cards Dennis. Sorry for holding onto these for so long, but this amount would not have been phone to scan with a cell phone. I'll be sure to hit you up with some good stuff soon. Have a few low end things, but I definitely need to work on some big ticket items.